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Monday, May 13, 2013

Amazon ADULT filter update: Exactly what inconsistencies?

I was recently asked about examples of Amazon's inconsistencies in the ADULT filter matter, so along with the recent email correspondence I've published here in the post below this, I'm making a point on explaining the inconsistencies a little, here. The most prudent advice I have on avoiding the filter in the first place would be to not use (parenthesis tags) in your book title, as that seems to get their attention a lot faster. Keyword searches will still bring up the book perfectly fine, but they aren't targetting things tagged by keyword as far as I can tell. It doesn't really make any consistent sense to anyone.

I've talked a lot about this recently and would like to keep posts that aren't more interesting and positive publication releases on the shorter side for browsing ease, so I'll cut the rest of this article behind a pagebreak to not bombard people with my rambling on not at all arrousing topics.

You can always check out my new Library page for recent erotica publications including lesbian BDSM and incest instead.

More about Amazon's filter follows the pagebreak:I originally mentioned the Amazon ADULT filter here, a few posts down. What they're effectively doing recently is targetting a list of bad words to filter alongside cover art. Those bad words include a lot of general kinks and even hit Romance titles. In no particular order they can include; Breeding, Pseudo-Incest (including family words), Gangbang, Creampie, BDSM, Rough, Monster, Ménage and likely more as they go around randomly filtering about half of the results for words they come across and dislike. Even if those words are part of popular mainstream accepted erotica.

You'll still find some results in the "All Department" search, but not all results. That's one of the main things that makes this filter so offensive. They try to claim to be the world's most customer-centric company by short-handing, lying through omission and hiding what their customers want? I'm not even talking about authors at this point, I have qualifications and years of experience in customer service and you don't give it by keeping half of your book stock in the back and only offering to check if a customergoes out of their way to ask if you have it?

Furthermore, as I mentioned last time, those books stop showing up on the "Also Bought/Browsed" tab. So the equivalent of shop staff in this analogy are not only withholding half their stock from you unless you know to ask, but they won't suggest something else you might also like.

That's not service, that's negligence.

To get around that, search in 'Kindle Store' where all these filtered titles will show up as if there was nothing wrong with them. Regardless of whether you're of legal age to view them or even want to view erotica in your search results. The filter isn't there to protect you or anyone.

So, cover content has been a longer standing thing that you should always be careful about, I had that issue recently with Shibari Shower, as it showed too much bare ass. But now you have to be careful about words, too. The best advice I can give, I bumped to the top of this article. Leave those words out of your book title and don't encourage them to take notice of it. The keyword search will still bring up the book as a search result for incest, breeding or anything perfectly fine, so the main thing you lose with not having it in the title is it isn't immediately obvious on your author profile list or if people are browsing very generally.

If a customer has made it that far, I'll trust that they're interested in your work enough to browse a little more. At the same time you can point them to your blog where you have a more in depth listing of what your books contain, like my recent Library update. It's annoying, and maybe a slight loss against a larger loss from the filter, but to be quite honest sometimes those (parenthesis tagged sections) can get a bit out of hand. I guess that's where Amazon's coming from, but their method doesn't justify the ends at all.